Active and Passive Verbs: An Introduction

*********************************************************************************************Active and Passive Verbs:An IntroductionMike JonesJune 2014(In the Public Domain. No rights reserved.)It is a useful, and often noted, distinction whether a given verb is used in the active or passive voice. However, it is also useful to distinguish whether a given verb is itself active or passive. This is suggested new terminology. Definition 1. An active verb is one for which the subject of the verb is the originator of the action, for example, the verb “to learn”, for example, “He is learning Latin.” Definition 2. A passive verb is one for which the subject of the verb is not the originator of the action, the originator of the action being, instead, some other agency. For example, the verb “to see” (in the sense of physical perception) is passive, because seeing something originates in a certain object existing in such a way as to be seen. In other words, whether a given verb is active or passive depends on who/what launched the process specified by the verb - the subject of the verb or some other agency. An active verb may or may not be transitive, and the same goes for a passive verb. Let’s consider the following examples, that embody the four possible combinations regarding the actual (as opposed to historical or habitual) present tense: 1. He is learning Latin. (an active verb in the active voice) 2. Latin is being learned by many people. (an active verb in the passive voice) 3. He sees a bird outside the window. (a passive verb in the active voice) 4 A bird is seen outside the window. (a passive verb in the passive voice) As the reader may have surmised from the above examples, active and passive verbs are not distinguished merely conceptually, but also grammatically, in the manner in which they relate to the actual present tense. (The grammatical present tense is used to convey three things: the actual present, the historical present, and habitual state or activity.) The grammatical distinction between active and passive verbs is that active verbs are used only in the progressive (-“ing”) form to express the actual present, and that verb is always assumed to be intended factually (as opposed to fancifully). Passive verbs, on the other hand, can be intended either factually or fancifully, with the factually-intended present tense expressed by the simple form of the present tense, and the fancifully-intended present tense (if applicable) expressed by the progressive (-“ing) form of the present tense. Thus, the present tense expressions of active and passive verbs are approximately the opposite, and this is a cardinal fact often not understood by ESL students. Of course, what is, from the standpoint of grammar, factually-intended, may be false, as in the case where a lie is being told, or where one is simply mistaken, and what is, from the standpoint of grammar, fancifully-intended, may be factual, as in the case where irony is being employed. Let’s consider a couple examples, using “see” (in the sense of physical perception), which is a passive verb. 1. “He sees a bird outside the window.” (The simple form of the present tense of “see” expresses what is intended to be taken as a factual statement of the actual present.) 2. “He is seeing things.” (The progressive (-“ing”) form of the present tense of “see” expresses what is intended to be taken as a fanciful statement of the actual present) Of course, “active” and “passive” are two poles, between which may be verbs of intermediate state, such as the verb “be”, the verb “support”, the verb “develop”, the verb “scare”, and the verb “frighten”. Verbs such as these can easily have the originator of the action controlled by the speaker. For example, there is a big difference between “He is good.” and “He is being good.”. In the first case the originator is some external judge, whereas in the second case the originator is the subject of the verb. An ESL student who regards these two sentences as synonymous has stepped into a pit of quicksand. The distinction between these two sentences is not one that is merely “understood”, but, on the part of native speakers, is felt marrow-deep. “become” is another active verb. Indeed, active verbs are often active by virtue of expressing some kind of becoming. For example, “learn” means “become knowledgeable about”, and “master” means “learn to perfection”. “He is becoming fat.” (actual present) “Roosevelt becomes president.” (historical present, such as a lead of a news story) “He becomes fat when he goes off his diet.” (habitual activity) Broken English (such as on the part of ESL students) consists to no small degree in their “tin ear” regarding the distinction between when to use the progressive form versus the simple form of a verb. Judging by context, a native speaker of English can decipher that, “He becomes fat.” is broken English for, “He is becoming fat.”, but a native speaker might be misunderstood by an English learner if the native speaker says, “He is seeing things.” (He is crazy.) - The English learner may very likely mistake this to mean, “He sees things.” (He has obtained valuable information for us.) The main point of this article is that traditional dictionaries of English do not advise, regarding any given active verb, that the verb is not used in the simple form of the present tense to express the actual present tense. (To give again an example from above, we never say “He learns Latin.” for the actual present tense. We say, “He is learning Latin.” - but you don’t get this crucially important information from any traditional dictionary of English.) Let us consider the example of “master” (in the sense of “learn to perfection”). The free online dictionary of Merriam-Webster is silent on the issue of the form of this verb when used to express the actual present tense. And this is par for the course: the free online dictionary of Merriam-Webster is silent on the same issue for all active verbs, so far as I am aware. This silence on the part of traditional dictionaries of English is a gaping hole in the documentation of English. Can learners of English be blamed for stumbling, when their supposedly most reliable guides have such feet of clay? And stumble they do. One outstanding example will underscore this phenomenon: a veteran U.N. translator, whose native language was not English, but whose job it was to translate from (among other languages) English into French, used the verb “master” (in the sense of “learn to perfection”) in the simple form of the present tense to express the actual present tense. The translator’s name was Claude Piron, and his mistake was made on a video that he made regarding the language barrier. To view this video, google for “The language challenge - facing up to reality”. (His mistake was that, “in a language they don’t master” should have been, “in a language they have not mastered”.) If gold should tarnish, should not iron rust? Claude Piron couldn’t get this right, but we’re expecting the masses of China to do so? Here is a comparison of active and passive verbs, by way of examples of usage.Active Verbs be: (conduct)factual: “He is being good.”habitual: “He is always good just before Christmas.” become:factual: “He is becoming fat.”habitual: “He becomes fat when he goes off his diet.” clean:factual: “I am cleaning the oven.”habitual: “I clean the oven once a month.” cook:factual: “She is cooking dinner.”habitual: “She cooks dinner every evening.” knead:factual: “She is kneading the dough.”habitual: “She kneads the dough when making bread.”Passive Verbs be: (judgement)factual: “He is good.” hear:factual: “I hear a bird singing outside.”fanciful: “Am I hearing things?” see:factual: “I see a bird outside.”fanciful: “Am I seeing things?” know:factual: “He knows Physics.” need:factual: “He needs a haircut.” *************************************************** See also my article: “A Catalog of Active and Passive Verbs”. (end of document)